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A Year of Recipes #9

I decided on Wednesday night I really needed to cook something. I think I have a good problem. 🙂 I planned ahead so I had all my ingredients already, so as soon as I managed to get in a workout I decided to make a Broccoli Quinoa Casserole.

Like most casseroles, this was easy to make. Cook your quinoa. Mix everything in a bowl. Chop up your broccoli if you don’t like big chunks. I could not find cream of broccoli soup at Walmart, Kroger or Target, so I went with cream of chicken. I figured more protein, why not? Looking back something like cream of celery or mushroom probably would have been a better option… I also didn’t use freshly grated parmesan.

In my casserole dish, ready to go in the oven! Look at that texture.

The biggest takeaway from this cooking experience is don’t do what I did – don’t make a casserole after working out, seriously. I was tired and it made me very impatient with the whole cooking process. Even though this was an easy dish every little step annoyed me. Ugh you mean I have to cut up the broccoli now? Why do I have to stir all this stuff? Why are there so many stupid ingredients, there’s got to be at least ten. Ugh. I pushed through but would have been happier getting this in the oven earlier in the evening, haha.

Despite a few swapped ingredients, everything worked out, and I think this is possibly the best tasting dish I’ve made so far this year! I don’t know if it is because of the cream of chicken substitute but it the casserole had a much more “tangy” flavor than I expected upon first taste (or perhaps the lite mayo is responsible.) However, after another bite I really liked the bold flavor.

Taking a picture of a casserole that doesn’t nasty is not an easy task!

Taste: 4/4Ease: 3.5/4 – Cooking quinoa can be slightly trickyGuiltless: 2/4 – Calories were good (four 320 servings) but not the most wholesome ingredientsLeftovers: 4/4 – These reheated perfectly!